28 Weeks Later - Horror

28 Weeks Later is a 2007 post apocalyptic horror movie, which is a sequel to 28 Days Later, directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo.

The film opens straight into a close up of a match, the lighting is low key and the shot is hand held.

The opening shot.

This shot is followed by another closeup, which keeps the viewer in the dark as to the location of the characters.

An extreme close up of Alice's face.

All of the shots in the opening are filmed hand held, which brings the viewer into the movie, and makes them relate to the group of survivors. There is no soundtrack, only diegetic sound and dialogue. The lighting is very low key, and appears to be only lit by candles, this creates a sense of claustrophobia in the movie.

Don and Alice look very dirty and exhausted.

The couple are shown to be coping, but the dialogue in this shot proves otherwise, Don asks Alice "Are you alright sweetheart?" to which she replies "Yeah I'm fine... No I'm not fine, it's all f*cked." This is the first real, solid statement that there is something very wrong.

The film then introduces the new minor characters that will die very shortly, a caring old woman, a man reading a newspaper (that he has obviously read many times), an old man that is trying to hold everyone together, and a young girl that has recently lost her boyfriend.

The young girl is very instrumental in the opening scene, as she is still obviously in denial that her boyfriend is probably dead.

The young girl 'Karen'  passes food to the place where her boyfriend would sit.

The man that was reading the newspaper, 'Jacob' bursts out at Karen in anger, saying that her boyfriend "Isn't breathing" and that "the only food he would be interested in is your neck."

Jacob bluntly tells Karen the truth, a close up is used to emphasise his emotion.

He finishes his speech by saying "There are no survivors, it's just is in here and them out there." This makes the viewer quickly speculate on what could be happening outside, then a heavy knock is heard by the people at the dinner table.

A range of shots, from close up to long are used to show the reactions of the people at the table

A close up on Jacob shows his surprise.

A long shot is used to show the reactions of everyone at the table.

A medium shot is used to show Don and Alice's indecision of whether to help.

Throughout these shots a non-diegetic score is building up, creating a foreboding atmosphere.

Don rushes to the door to help, but still picks up a weapon from the side as a precaution, as he opens the door the scene is flooded with light and the child outside is obviously terrified.

Don on the left, with the child on the right, a contrast between dark and light is used to great effect here.

The child is bought inside and recounts his story as Karen walks off on her own, upset as she thought it would have been her boyfriend.

Karen is then quickly attacked by the "Infected", our first glimpse of them shows them as crazed attackers. A fast series of extreme close ups and medium shots are used along with hand held cameras to create a sense of terror in the film.

Two shots used in quick succession are extreme close ups of eyes, the left shot shows an infected persons, and the right one shows Karens.

Another shot follows quickly and is a close up of an infected person biting Karen, which in turn will infect Karen. Jacob runs in and pulls her away from her attacker, who then falls onto him and turns.

An infected person bites Karen, infecting her.

Karen's eyes turn red, signifying that the infection has taken place.

After Karen is infected she tries to kill Jacob, Don then kills her with the crowbar, and tells the others to run.

The opening scene of this movie relies heavily on contrast, there is constant contrast between light and dark shots, loud and quiet shots, and peaceful and hectic shots.

Promotion

28 Weeks Later uses the colour red throughout its promotional material, this instils a sense of fear and foreboding in the viewer.

The DVD cover.

The DVD cover features one of the main characters of the film and only a simple colour scheme. The viewers eye is drawn to the surgical mask and this suggests that the infection is trying to be beaten.

28 weeks later poster.

The poster for 28 weeks later features the same colour scheme as the DVD cover, but features a more militaristic theme. It is created in the style of a genuine danger poster and draws the viewer in with the contrasting text.